acquaintance
a person known to one, but usually not a close friend.
the state of being acquainted or casually familiar with someone or something: As far as I know, no one of my acquaintance has traveled around the world.
personal knowledge as a result of study, experience, etc.: a good acquaintance with French wines.
(used with a plural verb) the persons with whom one is acquainted.
Origin of acquaintance
1- Also ac·quaint·ance·ship (for defs. 2, 3) .
synonym study For acquaintance
Other words for acquaintance
Other words from acquaintance
- non·ac·quaint·ance, noun
- non·ac·quaint·ance·ship, noun
- pre·ac·quaint·ance, noun
- pseu·do·ac·quaint·ance, noun
- re·ac·quaint·ance, noun
Words Nearby acquaintance
Dictionary.com Unabridged Based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023
How to use acquaintance in a sentence
As Coupang CEO Bom Kim sought to scale his business over the summer, Pham, previously considering an early retirement following his stint at Uber, was introduced by a mutual acquaintance, making their first meeting over video chat.
Uber’s former CTO is mapping out growth and delivery routes in his new gig | Lucinda Shen | October 28, 2020 | FortuneThat’s why a picture of a new baby from a long-ago acquaintance will vault to the top of your Facebook feed, even if you haven’t seen any other posts by that person for years.
Facebook’s new tool to stop fake news is a game changer—if the company would only use it | Jeff | October 18, 2020 | FortuneThe slowing down of the glaciers is a private plan by a glaciologist of my acquaintance who doesn’t want to get into the geo-engineering wars.
Kim Stanley Robinson Holds Out Hope - Issue 90: Something Green | Liz Greene | October 7, 2020 | NautilusI don’t want bloodshed or violence, and it hurts me to watch acquaintances and friends being beaten, and now I hear they’re getting ready to start shooting people.
So it seems like the answer is just to have a bunch of casual acquaintances to whom you can’t really feel anything terrible.
What Does Covid-19 Mean for Cities (and Marriages)? (Ep. 410) | Stephen J. Dubner | March 26, 2020 | Freakonomics
Should old acquaintance be forgot, just remember a few of the resolutions the Founding Fathers (would have) made this year.
Another acquaintance described Seevakumaran as “a creep,” who would “constantly hit on women.”
School Shooters Love This Pickup Artist Website | Brandy Zadrozny | December 5, 2014 | THE DAILY BEASTHe insulted a female poet of his acquaintance by remarking “that she and her family were Jews.”
Borges Had A Genius For Literature But Not Love Or Much Else | Allen Barra | October 24, 2014 | THE DAILY BEASTNot long ago, I mentioned the Victims of Communism Memorial to an acquaintance.
In the early 2000s, an acquaintance told Sun about the possibility of doing business in Ethiopia.
A child begins to make acquaintance with the images of things when set before a mirror.
Children's Ways | James SullyHe made the acquaintance of some courtiers, who felt or affected an interest in learning and in learned men.
Tobacco; Its History, Varieties, Culture, Manufacture and Commerce | E. R. Billings.By its operation Gordon Wright, the most sensible man of our acquaintance, is reduced to the level of infancy!
Confidence | Henry JamesIt was the Town Crier, with whom, as with a brother artist, he had picked acquaintance the day before.
The Joyous Adventures of Aristide Pujol | William J. LockeFor Lettice—the tender woman of his first acquaintance—had obviously experienced a moment of reaction.
The Wave | Algernon Blackwood
British Dictionary definitions for acquaintance
/ (əˈkweɪntəns) /
a person with whom one has been in contact but who is not a close friend
knowledge of a person or thing, esp when slight
make the acquaintance of to come into social contact with
those persons collectively whom one knows
philosophy the relation between a knower and the object of his knowledge, as contrasted with knowledge by description (esp in the phrase knowledge by acquaintance)
Derived forms of acquaintance
- acquaintanceship, noun
Collins English Dictionary - Complete & Unabridged 2012 Digital Edition © William Collins Sons & Co. Ltd. 1979, 1986 © HarperCollins Publishers 1998, 2000, 2003, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2009, 2012
Other Idioms and Phrases with acquaintance
see nodding acquaintance; scrape up an acquaintance.
The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary Copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
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